A new date has been set for the multimillion-dollar fraud case involving Olalekan Ponle, aka Mr Woodberry.
This is contained in court documents from the Northern District of Illinois.
“This docket entry was made by the Clerk on Tuesday, January 25, 2022: MINUTE entry before the Honourable Robert W. Gettleman as to Olalekan Jacob Ponle: At the parties’ request, telephonic status hearing set for 1/26/2022 is stricken and reset to 3/4/2022 at 9:30 a.m,” the court document said.
Mr Ponle was arraigned on a separate charge in Chicago last July. He was arrested in Dubai alongside Hushpuppi and charged in a U.S. District Court in Chicago with conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
In July, the U.S. government had applied for a motion of dismissal without prejudice granted by Mr Gettleman.
A complaint had accused Mr Ponle of orchestrating “business email compromise” schemes to defraud several U.S.-based companies.
The court documents said “the schemes resulted in attempted or actual losses to victim companies in the tens of millions of dollars, including a Chicago-based company that was defrauded into sending wire transfers totalling $15.2 million.”
The jury’s eight-count charge of wire fraud still holds, meaning Mr Ponle stands to forfeit, to the U.S. government, any property derived from proceeds in his offences.